Conventionally, there is a known method of remote detection for detecting types and operating states of electric devices deployed in the home by using the characteristic quantity of the electric devices (Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2003-259569).
In this method of remote detection, users will learn the characteristic quantity of the respective electric devices and will have registered the characteristic quantity with the database preliminarily, and upon receiving the characteristic quantity of the respective electric devices from the outlet units to which the respective electric devices are connected, the home server compares the received characteristic quantity with those registered with the database to detect types and operating states of the respective electric devices.
The users accesses the home server over the Internet and obtains the types and operating states of the respective electric devices detected by the home server. In this manner, the users can remotely obtain types and operating states of electric devices in the home. In addition, if the positions of outlets are known preliminarily, connecting positions of the electric devices are also detected.